Retired Lorain cop says sex-on-duty hierarchy existed

LORAIN — A retired Lorain police sergeant has said that when he was on the force, his fellow officers engaged in “nonconsensual sexual misconduct” with members of the public while they were on duty and weren’t meaningfully disciplined for it, according to court documents filed Wednesday.

“As a result of this behavior, I believe this led other Lorain police officers to engage in this misconduct which they would not have engaged in,” Dennis Davis wrote in an affidavit signed in April.

Davis, who retired in 2007, is the second former Lorain police officer to accuse the department of condoning sexual misconduct by officers. The other former officer, Jesus Sanchez, is at the center of a federal lawsuit that accuses the city of ignoring the complaints of Sarah Long, the woman he was convicted of stalking.

Davis’ affidavit was part of court documents filed by Mike Duff, Long’s attorney, opposing a request from the city asking a federal judge to declare the city did nothing wrong without holding a trial.

Long already has settled the portion of her lawsuit against Sanchez in exchange for him testifying about how his superiors allegedly ignored sexual misconduct by him and other officers. It was his affidavit laying out his misdeeds and accusations against other officers that led prosecutors to charge him.

Sanchez’s attorney, Terry Gilbert, has said his client was targeted for agreeing to work with Long against his fellow officers.

Although the city’s attorney, Todd Raskin, could not be reached for comment Wednesday, he argued earlier this year that the city did not condone sexual misconduct by officers.

Raskin wrote that Sanchez said during a deposition that a select group of officers were allowed to get away with sexual misconduct, but Sanchez wasn’t among them. That runs counter to Sanchez’s allegations that all Lorain police officers believed they wouldn’t be punished for sexual misconduct.

“Sanchez had no reason to believe that he could do so, and every reason to know that he could not,” Raskin wrote.

In the documents filed Wednesday, Duff points to numerous incidents of sexual misconduct by officers since Lorain police Chief Cel Rivera took the job in 1994.

“(Rivera) testified there were 30 of these complaints relating to non-consensual sexual contact involving a police officer and a third-party,” Duff wrote.

For instance, Duff wrote about a woman who accused now-former Lorain police Officer Stanley Marrero of having sex with the victim in a domestic violence call in 2000 after telling the woman’s husband to leave the scene.

Marrero received a three-day suspension, Duff wrote, adding that during a deposition of Rivera, the chief agreed that Marrero’s conduct in that case “shocked the conscience.”

Although he wasn’t charged in that incident, Marrero has been convicted of intimidation, dereliction of duty and public indecency, and is awaiting trial on a rape charge stemming from a 1993 incident in which he allegedly forced himself on a woman while responding to a call at her home.

Duff also lists numerous other incidents of alleged misconduct by other officers, including stalking, forced sexual encounters, armed threats and other behavior he contends shows a pattern of ignoring misconduct by Lorain police over the years.